TV Overnights: An evening of finales see Call the Midwife end on a high
Once Friday night’s soap fatigue wore off and the light entertainment of Saturday night dried up, Sunday brought a swift end to many popular series.
Friday
BBC One offered up some stale prime time treats to a dithering audience of Friday night, with only EastEnders (8pm) providing needy viewers with some dramatic nourishment. With repeats of The Vicar of Dibley (8:30pm) and New Tricks (9pm) pulling in 2.9 and 3.3 million viewers respectively, it would be up to the London soap to keep the flagship channel’s head above water.
8 million viewers tuned in to see the aftermath of Denise and Ian’s Saw-like experience, after being trapped in the storage room of terror for the night. The soap brought in BBC One’s biggest audience of the day and a 35% share.
Over on the rival station, ITV also brought in Friday night success through the prestigious medium of soap. Emmerdale bagged 6.7 million viewers at 7pm, with two episodes of Coronation Street locking in the night’s biggest audience. Friday’s trip to Weatherfield saw happy simpleton Jason looses his most prized possession in the most horrific of ways.
In a moment of jealousy Karl decided to get revenge on his ex-girlfriend’s much younger fella by stealing and then torching his van. 8.5 million (a 38% share) tuned in for the first episode at 7:30pm, making it the biggest hit of the night. The second visit, which saw Jason lie in a ball sobbing uncontrollably, was watched by 7.9 million and a 33% share.
ITV ruled the 9pm slot as single celled gimp Piers Morgan spent another hour pretending to probe a celebrity in Piers Morgan’s Life Stories.
This week, Torvill and Dean spent an hour promoting ITV’s Sunday night show and dodged the intense, take-no-prisoners and selfless brand of journalism trademarked by Piers – voice of the people. 5.9 million viewers accepted this as a fine way to spend their Friday night, securing a 25% share.
Saturday
Saturday’s TV was much more varied and eventful with two Six Nations games easing viewers into the evening. Scotland v Wales was first up at 2pm, with 3.6 million viewers watching the Welsh side fight their way to victory.
Later at 4:30pm, Ireland clashed with France at the Aviva Stadium at Lansdowne Road with 4.3 million viewers catching the draw.
Ant and Dec pander to celebrities for a living, but unlike their mate Piers they fully embrace their role in life instead of adopting his crabby authoritative attitude. 6.5 million viewers gleefully showed up for Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway (ITV, 7pm) resulting in a 29% share. The cheeky chappies, still getting away with it after all these years, secured Saturday’s biggest audience.
Saturday night nonsense summed up in a bottle, The Cube (ITV, 8:30pm) followed as Philip Schofield made members of the public do unspeakably embarrassing things to themselves for a bit of cash. 4 million viewers watched as paedogeddon instigator, Schofield, locked people in his purpose built box of shame, resulting in an 18% share.
The Jonathon Ross Show followed at 9:20pm, netting 3 million viewers but ITV’s Saturday night campaign was over shadowed by BBC One. The National Lottery: In It to Win It (BBC One, 8:30pm) featuring orange apparition Dale Winton, brought in 4.9 million viewers.
Casualty was up next at 9:20pm, and even if it was Saturday night the medical drama didn’t go easy on the audience. 4.9 million viewers tuned in to see the happy tale of a drunk, accident prone and pregnant woman. But at least Ash, a familiar face from yesteryear, was back to balance out the bleakness.
Sunday
Last night saw many Christmases come early for the team on Countryfile (BBC One, 7pm) as a very special guest helped celebrate the 25th anniversary edition. The presenters polished their finest pair of wellies and practiced their warmest, yet respectfully distant, smile as Prince Charles opened the gates to his Gloucestershire farm.
Julia Bradbury and John Craven fawned and cooed over HRH, who appears to be the leader of the odd Countryfile cult. While the two top level presenters were seduced by the Prince’s anecdotes and politeness, the other two less complex organisms Adam Henson and Matt Baker behaved like thick headed love rivals at a barn dance. They even went as far as facing off in a completion to sort out HRH’s overgrown bush. Of which there is a lot of.
The uncomfortable love-in all got a bit much as the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall had to deal with the aggressively pally attention, with Adam Henson coming across as particularly manic. 7.2 million people, the second biggest audience of the day, tuned in to see the networking opportunity, resulting in a 30% share.
At the same time over on ITV, Dancing on Ice (7pm) instigated a night of finales as some of Sunday’s favourite shows came to an end. The eighth series of the skating competition (which has been officially going on since August 1959) finally came to a close as just three of the original 1000 celebrities remained.
While the ratings have been solid this series they haven’t been as phenomenal as ITV would have hoped for. As is the rule of law in TV land, performing less than phenomenally could very well have meant that last night’s finale might be the last viewers see of the series until the inevitable nostalgia-fuelled relaunch in, let’s say, three years’ time.
6.7 million viewers soaked up their last bit of Bolero action as Olympic Gymnast (now, that’s hardly fair, is it?) Beth Tweddle was crowned queen of the soggy ice rink, much to the admiration and envy of her peers. The last chance to see Torvill and Dean in their special little dancing outfits secured a 25% share.
At 8pm, both BBC’s One and Two were dealing with losses of their own. Hardest felt will be a significantly important staple in BBC One’s Sunday schedule as those crazy midwives of Poplar snapped on those latex gloves for the last time in the second series of Call the Midwife.
The return of the notorious East End bicycle gang has proved a runaway success for the channel with last night being no exception. The final visit to Nonnatus House saw Miranda Hart’s Chummy prepare for a little delivery of her own.
Luckily, Chummy decided not to bring her work home and went with the help of her friends instead. The final bout of good old fashioned buttoned-down fun netted 8.6 million viewers and a 29% share, the biggest audience of the weekend.
Perhaps Jeremy Clarkson and his mates will be missed too, in their own special way. Sunday night surely won’t be the same without Jer, Hammo and the other one and their seriously hilare brand of scripted and unspontaneous banter.
For some really, really stupid reason Top Gear Africa Special: Part 2 saw the trio chasing down the source of the Nile as if their children’s overpriced education depended on it. 4.7 million viewers (a 16% share) watched as the holy trinity of pointlessness talked about their beat up cars a little too passionately, as if this whole trip was anything other than an extensive holiday on the licence fee payers’ expense.
It was back over to ITV at 9pm and poor old Mr Selfridge got all misty eyed as he waved us goodbye. But not to worry, he spent his last night making a special new friend. Series one of the historical drama that doesn’t let the history stand in way of the drama saw the retail king make Bessie mates with (totes omg!) King Edward VII.
5.3 million viewers watched as the special relationship extended to an eventful night out at the theatre, pulling in a 21%
As a week of dark and moody crime drama wrapped up, viewers were introduced to yet another dark and moody crime serial. Not to fear folks, this one was well different from the norm. Shetland (BBC One, 9pm), the new two part thriller based on an Ann Cleeves novel, introduced us to morose inspector Jimmy Perez who was well-matched to the grim landscapes of the title.
The biggest surprise of the night was that after the blitz of community-decay thriller Mayday and the well-received Broadchurch, was that viewers had any room in their fragile minds for yet another customary and shadowy tale. 6.3 million viewers welcomed the latest slice of murder in a small town with open arms, pulling in a 26% share, the biggest in the 9pm slot.
With all the dependable staples of the night dried up, whatever will next Sunday look like?
Overnight data is available each morning in mediatel.co.uk’s TV Database, with all BARB registered subscribers able to view reports for terrestrial networks and key multi-channel stations.